VI I THE HMD IDER THE SEAT. %%%»%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%»%^ Did I ever tell you, or did you ever bear from other sources, how logical deductions and obivious inferences once led me into what might have proved deep waters? asked Detective Sergeant Channing, as he threw his feet up on a chair and settled himself comfortably. It was a winter's night, cold, bard, and frosty, eight or nine years since. I had been down to Cliffe to spend a few hours with a friend, and was going onto Sharnal street, the next station down, to (spend the night with another friend. I was walking up and down the de serted j)latforin, thinking of various things, when my foot kicked up against something which went sliding ulong the platform, and fell upon the down line. My inquisitiveness im pelled me to jump down and search for It with the "aiding light of a lucifer. It turned out to be a novel—l forgot the title—and was in a very damaged condition. My explanation of the torn cover and the bent corner was that they were the outcome of the book having been flung out of the window of a passing train. I took it into the licrlit of an asth matical lamp and examined it. There was writing on the fly leaf—writing in pencil, and the shakiness of it and the uncertainty of the lines immediately suggested to me that they had been written in the train. The words them selves convinced me. They were:— "Man hiding under the seat of this compartment Believe he has designs on valuables I have about me. Com munication cord broken. Only way to inform in case anything occurs; and with anchor tattooed on wrist. Left hand." For a moment I half suspected it was a practical joke. Then it occurred to me that there was more in the affair than lame humor. Cliffe is on the line to Queenborougli, where one can take boat for Flushing, which is in Holland, the principal town of which, Amster dam, is well known as a trading place for dealers in precious stones. The logical deduction was, therefore, that the writer of the message was travel ing with jewels from London to Am sterdam via Queenborougli and Flush ing. Possibly he had a small fortune in gems upon his person, and was un easy in his mind. Possibly the man traveling under theseatof hiscompart xnent. but for whose presence the other would have been alone, had des'gns upon the valuables lie carried, and, realizing he could not stop the express owing to the communication cord being broken, he decided upon the novel method of giving the police a clue in the possible event of the hiding man killing him to obtain the valuables. I knew quite well that the Queen borough express had run through Cliff.' three-quarters of an hour b 'fore, and it had by that time reached its destin ation. Going over to the station master's office, I showed that official the mes sage and explained my conclusion. lie agreed that the affair might be serious. The only tiling he could not under stand was the point that the man un der the seat must have taken up his position before the other man entered the compartment, and this did not sug gest tlint he had designs upon the other, because he could not rely upon the other choosing that particular com partment. But I pointed out to him that the hiding man may have taken up his position in a compartment next to that of his intended victim, expect ing to get along by the footboard at the first opportunity and that the other man, for some reason, might have changed into the next compartment at Gravesend, thus walking into the enemy's camp unconsciously, and not discovered his enemy's presence until the train was running between Graves end and Cliffe. To oblige me he wired down the line to Tort Victoria, and shortly after wards came the news that nothing absolutely pointing to a crime had come under notice. But that, in a second-class smoking compartment, a quantity of blood had been found by a guard. A .peculiar fact was, however, that no body had been found. If a murder bad been done, what had become o? the body? If only an assault had been committed, why had the victim neither been found in the compartment nor given information? So he wired back to Tort Victoria, giving them details, advising them to make immediate in quiries and to search the lino. Very shortly after that we received a mes sage to the effect that blood had also been found upon the footboard on the down-side of the compartment on the floor of which similar stains had been discovered. The police had been in formed, and already a search party had been sent up the line. I wired full particulars to Scotland Yard, and, on receiving instructions to personally conduct the inquiry, I or ganized a search gang, and, armed with naphtha lamps, we set out down the line to meet those coming from Port Victoria. We went along as far as Sharnal street without discovering anything, and from that station we wired on for information. In reply we were advised that stains of blood had been found at the side of the down metals, half way between Sharnal and Port Vic toria, and that a track of stains had been followed down the embankment and half across a field. This new fact appeared Important, seeming to suggest tnat either the assailant or his wounded victim had Jumped out of the running train, and escaped across the fields. But U it were the assailant, where was his vic tim? If the victim, where was the assailant? Could it be that the latter had by any means taken the former with liim? I rather fancied it possible. It might turn out that the tattooed man had killed his victim, thrown him from the train, jumped after hijn, and disposed of the body in some way, reckoning that the crime could not be discovered except by accident, and not until he was without the read; of the law. As soon as it was light we were on the supposed tracks. We followed them across a field to where they stopped before a gate in a hedge. There were no other tracks; no trace of any body could we find. But we did discover a new jack-knife, which might, however, have belonged to any one. Here we were entirely at fault. In the hope of discovering something that might lead to estabishing the identity of tlie supposed victim.l had inquiries made in London of all the diamond merchants and big jewelers. But none had sent any one traveling with val uables, and advices from Amsterdam informed me that 110 messenger was expected there with stones or gems from London. 1 was sorely puzzled, and hardly knew what to do or to think, when I received a telegram from Scotland Yard saying that Robert Ryan, who had broken jail a few days before, was described as having an anchor tattooed 011 the wrist of his left hand. Here was a clue indeed! We were 110 longer hunting a mere hand, but a man. I had not been advised until that moment that It.van, who had been an otficer in the navy, but was sentenced to four years for forgery, had escaped from prison. But I knew a lot about him, and this knowledge suggested to iue that he would seek his erstwhile sweetheart the moment he felt he could safely do so. But the same knowledge of him precluded me from thinking that lie could have com mitted a murder for mere gain, unless —good gracious, the whole case seemed to be clear as day to me! The mere name cleared the whole mystery. Robert Ryan had always protested his innocence of the charge of forgery. But the evidence was dead against him. I had seen him in custody on one occasion, though it was not my case, and lie had darkly hinted that a cousin of his had worked up the whole charge against him to separate liim from his fiance, whom the cousin loved and he said to me that when he had regained liberty he would be able to prove that he was the victim of jealousy, and that he had suffered for another's crime. The story, though I could not believe it, interested me so much that I was led into making a few private inquiries as to who the cousin could be; and, finally,l decided that the only person possible was Herbert Ryan. And now it rushed across my mind that the two Ryans might be the persons of the mystery; Robert, the hand under the seat; and Herbert, the writer of the message. Possibly, Herbert had not recognized the hand, and honestly be lieved the hiding man had designs upon property he carried. Or lie may have recognized the hand, and feared the anger of his cousin. In any case, Robert's belief that his cousin had put him in prison was ample motive for his seeking to murder Herbert. I wired up my suspicions to the yard, and set out for the place where I be lieved Robert Ryan's sweetheart was staying, for 1 had reason to know* the charge against him had not changed her, as I have explained. 1 reached the house in the afternoon, and was informed that the young lady. Miss Duncan, was out. I mentioned a time when I would return to see Miss Duncan, and went away. Rut I did not go far. Making sure that 110 one was watch ing. I crept round the walls of the gar den which surrounded the house, and listened for the sound of any voices. But I could hear 110 one—no sound but the distant sea beating upon the beach. I thought I might as well have a look at the stretch of blue waters to while away the time before going back to see Miss Duncan. So I wandered over the downs towards the edge of the steep cliffs. As I stood on the edge of the cliff I caught sight of two lonely figures slowly walking on my left. One was that of a woman, the other was that of a tall man. Fancying I could guess who tlicy were, and noticing they were coming in my direction, I threw myself down lest they should see me silhouetted against the sky. I watched them draw nearer. Then they turned and retraced their steps. Once I saw the woman throw out her hand impetuously to the man, who seized it and pressed it to his lips. There was now little or no doubt in my mind as to who they were, and walking along the cliffs until I came to a place where the descent was fair ly e sy, I made my way slowly down. Reaching the hard beach, I stayed in hiding where I could watch them. I saw them turn agalu, and come leisurely towards me. I could hear the murmur of their voices over the babble of the sea, but I could not catch their words—they talked in undertones. As they drew up near to where I stood I jumped out and ran towards them. The man started at my ap proach, but made no attempt to eluda me. "Robert Ryan," I cried, "I arrest you!" "It 1» of little consequence," here piled, coldly. "But I would ratlier Lave surrendered myself. I am uow In possession of evidence which will prove my innocence and that I was unjustly punished." "That is not the only thing for which we want you," I said. "You are sus pected of having murdered a gentle man between Cliffc and Port Victoria." "Is he dead?" he cried. "We have reason to think so." He laughed lightly, but rather an evil, unnatural laugh. "I don't think so," he said. "I was very near strangling him at one mo ment, but he gave In like the wise and cowardly wretch he is. Shall I tell you all I know? See, 1 have here— wormed from him by threats—a writ ten confession that he committed the forgery and swore false evidence against me, and he told me where I shall And the proofs of all he did to ruin me and my good name." I took the paper—a half-sheet of common note-paper covered in pencilled words; and I readily recognized the writing as being the same as that of the message in the novel. It was, as he said, a full confession, and signed with the name of Herbert Ryan. "I got to London," he began, while I was yet reading, "after my escape, determined upon coming down here to see Miss Duncan before I thought of anything else. I meant to walk all the way, but I overestimated my strength—impaired by 15 bitter months in prison—and the boots I had stolen from a rubbish heap were stiff and heavy; I had to throw them off and go barefooted, as you see me now. So be fore I reached Gravesend I decided to risk recapture, and steal a ride. I waited In a cutting for the coming of a chance to board a train unseen, and my luck was good enough to bring one to a standstill within a few hundred yards of me. "I boarded it, and having found an unoccupied compartment, 1 got in and scrambled under the seat. To my dis may, at Gravesend a man got into the compartment. I feared he would no tice me and call the guard, but he didn't and the train set off again. It was a tortuous position I was in cramped in every limb, not daring to move lest the passenger should notice ine and stop the train, and I had b td ly cut my foot on a stone in walking along the - and the "wound caused me great pain, and bled not a little. "I could only see the legs of the pas senger, who sat on the opposite s at. I was dreadfully afraid that he would stretch out his legs and kick me any moment. But he did not. After a time, however, he grew restless, and went to sit at the corner farthest front me. I could not see what he did, tut I could pretty well guess that after he had changed his seat he opened the window and tried to pull the communi cation-cord, and I heard a low oath as the cord ran slack in his hands, j Had I not guessed the cord was wrong I should have slipped up and .lumped i out of the train before it pulled up. But I understood, and kept quiet to consider what I should do. I twisted my head slightly, and in this way was able to see him take a book out of his bag; and I saw his hands writing in it. Presently the roar in front of the train told me that we were running through a station; and I saw ltiin lean to tlie right and fling the book out of the win- I dow. His head came so low that I saw his face and recognized him as my traitor of a cousin. "I wormed myself out and confronted him. He did not seem in the least surprised to see inc ite told me later that he recognized my hand by the tattooed anchor—but pro fessed the greatest pleasure at seeing inc. But all the while his face was pale as death, and his hands shook like thoße of a palsied titan. I had some difficulty in dealing with him. Once 1 put my fingers around his throat, and felt like strangling him. He told me what I wished to know—how I eould clear myself, so I released my hold. I made him write that confession and duly sign it.and with it on me 1 got on to the footboard as soon as the train slowed down, and jumped. I opened the wound in my foot in jumping and had to pause awhile, it pained me so. I hung about the fields for a time, then cut away to see Miss Duncan. That's all. Herbert was going over to Hol land. He won't stop there now be cause I know how and where 1 can find proof to convict him of the crime for which he had me sentenced. He told me that himself. "Let me just speak to Miss Duncan in private for one moment, sir," he con cluded. "I give you my word of honor that I will not attempt to escape; and then I shall be ready to accompany you to prove my innocence." He kept his word well, not only about escaping, but as to proving his innocence. And I had an invitation to his wedding, not long after.—Tit-Bits. Uncle Sam's Vegetable Garden. Teople who were amused in the days of Holman, at that great economist's suggestion that potatoes instead of flowers might be planted in the grounds around the public buildings may not b:> aware that Uncle Sam has a great garden of spring delicacies around the Capitol building. The first garden delicacies of the season are found there. On the southern slope of the lawn under the protection of the terrace and exposed to the sun, the dandelions have begun to sprout, and a few days ago some old women and children who know the secrets of the soil were out with their baskets gathering these "greens" for the table Mushrooms of the best variety, as well as dandelions, grow in great abuu dance on this broad lawn, and it is o source df supply of "greens" or mush rooms almost from the time snow disappears until w:nter comes again. •-Washington Star. DIL TALMAGE'S SERMON. SUNDAY'S DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED DIVINE. Subject: Go<l'i Saving Grace—Religion L an Active Principle Which Work. Constantly For the Welfare of Body and Mind and Soul—Hope For Sinner*. [Copyright IIKHII WASHINGTON, D. C.—Dr. Talmage is now traveling in Norway, where he has been deeply interested in the natural phe nomena and the quaint social life of that wonderful land. In this sermon he ar gues, contrary to the opinion of many, that religion is an active principle which works constantly for the welfare of body and mind and soul. His text is Luke xiv, 34. "Salt is good." The Bible is a dictionary of the finest similes. It employs among living creat ures storks and eagles and doves and uni corns and sheep and cattle; among trees, sycamores and terebinths and pomegran ates and almonds and apples; among jew els, pearls and amethysts and jacinths and chrysoprnses. Christ uses no stale illustrations. The lilies that He plucks in His discourse are dewy fresh; the ravens in His discourses are not stuffed specimens of birds, but warm with life from wing tip to wing tip; the fish He points to are not dull about the gills, as though long cap tured, but a-squirm in the wet net just brought up on the beach of Tiberias. In my text, which is the peroration of one of His sermons, He picks up a crystal and 1 oMs it before His congregation as an illus tration of divine grace in the heart when He saj-s what we all know by experiment, "Salt is good." 1 shall try to carry out the Saviour's idea in this text and in the first place say to you that grace is like salt in its beauty. In Gallicia there are mines of salt with ex cavations and underground passages reach ing, I am told, 280 miles. Far underground there are chapels and halls of reception, the columns, the altars and the pulpits of salt. When the king and the princes come to visit these mines, the whole place is illuminated, and the glory of crystal walls and crystal ceilings and crystal floors and crystal columns, under the glare of the torches and the lamps, needs words of crys tal to describe it. But you need not go so far as that to find the beauty of salt. You live in a land which produces millions of bushels of it in a year, and you can take the morning rail train and in a few hours get to the salt mines and salt springs, and you have this article morning, noon and night on your table. Salt has all the beauty of the snowflake and water foam, with durability added. It is beautiful to the naked eye, but under the glass you see the stars, and the diamonds, and the white tree branches, and the splinters, and the bridges of fire as the sun glints them. There is more architectural skill in one of these crystals of salt than human inge nuity has ever demonstrated in an Alhain bra or St. Peter's. • » , It would take all time, with atl .infringe ment upon eternity, for an angel of Ot>d~ to tell one-half the glories in a salt crystal. So with the grace of God; it is perfectly beautiful. I have seen it smooth out wrin kles of care from the brow; I have seen it make an aged man feel almost young again: I have seen it lift the stooping shoulders and put sparkle into the dull eyp. Solomon discovered its therapeutic quali ties when he said, "It is marrow to the bones." It helps to digest the food and to purify the blood and to calm the pulses ann quiet the spleen, and instead of Tyn dall's prayer test of twenty years ago, put ting a man in a philosophical hospital to be experimented upon by prayer, it keeps him so well that he does not need to be prayed for as an invalid. I am sneaking now of a healthy religion—not of that morbid relig ion that sits for three hours on a grave stone reading Hervey's "Meditations Among the Tombs"—a religion that pros pers best in a bad state of the liver! I speak of the religion that Christ preached. I suppose, when that religion has con quered the world, that disease will be ban ished, and that a man 100 years of age will come in from business and say, "I am tired; I think it must be time for me to go."and without one physical pang heaven will have him. But the chief beauty of grace is in the soul. It takes that which was hard and cold and rejuilsive and makes it all over again. It pours upon one's nature what David calls "the beauty of holiness." It extirpates everything that is hateful and unclean. If jealousy and pride and lust and worldliness lurk about, they are chained and have a very small sweep. Jesus throws upon the soul the fragrance of a summer garden as He comes in say ing, "I am the Hose of Sharon," and He submerges it with the glory of a spring morning, as Ile.says, "I am the light." Oh, how much that grace did for the three Johns! It took John Bunyan, the foul mouthed, and made him John Bun van, the immortal dreamer; it took John Newton, the infidel sailor, and in the midst of the hurricane made him cry out, "My mother's God, have mercy upon me!" It took John Summerfield from a life of sin and by the hand of a Christian maker of edge tools led him into the pulpit that burns still with the light of that Christian eloquence which charmed thousands to the Jesus whom He once despised. Ah, you mav search all the earth over for anything so beautiful or beautifying as the grace of God! Go all through the deep mine pas sages of Wieliczka and amid the under ground kingdoms of salt in Hallstadt and show me anything so transcendently beau tiful as this grace of God fashioned and hung in eternal crystals. Again, grace is like salt in the fact that it is a necessity of life. Man and beast perish without salt. What are those patli9 across the western prairie? Whv, they were made there by deer and buffalo going to and coming away from the salt "licks. Chemists and physicians all the world over tell us that salt is a necessity of life. And so with the grace of God; you must have it or die. I know a great many speak of it as a mere adornment, a sort of shoulder strap adorning a soldier, or a light, froth ing dessert brought in after the greatest part of the banquet of life is over, or a medicine to be taken after powders and mustard plasters have failed to do their work, but ordinarily a mere superfluity, a string of bells around a horse's neck while he draws the load and in nowise helping him to draw it. So far from that I deciare the grace of God to be the first and the last necessity. It is food we must take or starve into an eternity of famine. It is clothing, without which wo freeze to the mast ol infinite terror. It is the plank, and the only plank, on which we can float shoreward. It is the ladder, and the only ladder, on which we can climb up into the light. It is a postive necessity for the soul. You can tell very easily what the effect would be if a person refused to take salt into the body. The energies would fail, the lungs would struggle with the air, slow fevers would crawl through the brain, the heart would flutter, and the life would be gone. Salt, a necessity for the life of the body; the grace of God, a necessity for the life of the soul! Again, I remark that grace is like salt in abundance. God has strewn salt in vast profusion all over the continents. Russia seems built on a salt-cellar. There is one region in that country that turns out 00,000 tons of salt in a year. England and Russia and Italy have inexhaustible resources in this respect. Norway and Sweden, white with snow above, white with salt beneath. Austria, vielding 900,000 tons annually. Nearly all the nations rich in it —rock salt, spring salt, sea salt. Christ, the Creator of the world, when He uttered our text, knew it would become more and more significant as the shafts were sunk, and the springs were bored, and the pumpe were worked, and the crys tals were gathered. So the grace of God is abundant. It is for all lands, for all ages, for all conditions. It seems to undergirt everything—pardon for the worst sin, com fort for the sharpest suffering, brightest light for the thickest darkness. Around about the salt lakes of Saratov there are 10,000 men toiling day and night, and yet they never exhaust the saline treas ures. And if the 1,600,000,000 of our race should now cry out to God for His mercy there would be enough for all—for those furthest gone in sin, for the murderer standing on the drop of the gallows. It is an ocean of mercy, and if Europe and Asia, Africa. North and South America, and all the islands of the sea went down in it to-day they would have room enough to wash and come up clean. Let no man think that his case is too tough a one for God to act upon. Though your sin may be deep and raging, let me tell you that God's grace is a bridge not built on earthly piers, but suspended and spanning the awful chasm of your guilt, one end resting upon the rock of eternal promises and the other on the foundations of heaven. Demetrius wore a robe so in crusted with jewels that no one after him ever dared to wear it. Hut our King, Jesus, takes off the robe of His righteousness, a robe blood dyed and heaven impearled, and reaches it out to the worst wretch in all the earth and says:"Put that on! Wear it now! Wear it forever!" Again, the grace of God is like salt in the way we come at it. The salt on the surface is almost always impure which incrusts the Rocky Mountains and the South American pampas and in India —but the miners go down through the shafts and through the dark labyrinths and along by galleries of roclc, and with torches and pickaxes, find their way under the very foundations of the earth to where the salt lies that makes up the nation's wealth. To get to the best saline springs of the earth huge machinery goes down, boring depth below depth, depth below depth, until from under the very roofs of the mountains the saline water supplies the aqueduct. This water is brought to the surface and is exposed in tanks to the sun for evaporation, or it is putin boilers mightily heated and the water evaporates, and the salt gathers at the bottom of the tank. The work is completed, and the for tune is made. Have you not been in enough trouble to have that work goon? I was reading of Aristotle, who said there was a field of flowers in Sicily so sweet that once a hound, coming on the track of game, came to that field and was bewildered by the perfumes and so lost the track. Oh, that our souls might become like "a field which the Lord hath blessed" and exhale so much of the sweetness of Christian character that the hounds of temptation, coming on our track, might lose it and go Howling back with disappointment! But I remark again that the grace of God is like the salt in its preservative quality. You know that) salt absorbs the moisture of articles of food and infuses them with brine, which preserves them for a long while. Salt is the great antiputre factor of the world. Experimenters, in preserving wood, have tried sugar and and air-tight jars and everything else, but as long as the world stands Christ's wohft will be suggestive, and men will admit that 4s- a j*reat preservative "salt is good." But for the grace of God the earth would have become a stale carcass long before this. That grace is the only presA-vative of laws and constitutions and literatures. Just as soon as a government loses this salt of divine grace it perishes. The philo sophy of this day, so far as it is antagonis tic to this religion, putrefies and stinks. The great want of our schools of learning and our institutions of science to-day is not more Leyden jars and galvanic batter ies and spectroscopes and philosophical ap paratus, but more of that grace that will teach our men of science that the God of the universe is the God of the Bible. How strange it is that in all their mag nificent sweep of the telescope they have not seen the morning star of Jesus, and that in all their experiments with light and heat they have not seen the light and felt the warmth of the Sun of Righteousness! We want more of the salt of God's grace in our homes, in our schools, in our col leges, in our social life, in our Christianity. And that which has it will live; that which has it not will die. I proclaim the tenden cy of everything earthly to putrefaction and death, the religion of Christ the only preservative. Mv subject is one of great congratulation to those who have within their souls this gospel antiseptic. This salt will preserve them through the temptations and sor rows of life and through the ages of eter nity. I do not mean to say that you will have a smooth time because you are a Christian. On the contrary, if you do your whole duty I will promise you a rough time. You march through an enemy's country, and they will try to double up both flanks and to cut you oft from your source of supplies. The war you wage will riot be with toy arrows, but sword plunged to the hilt, and spurring on your steed over heaps of the slain. But I think that God omnipotent will see you through. I know He will. Hut why do I talk like an atheist when I ought to say I know He will? "Kept by the power of God through faith unto complete salvation." When Governor Geary, of Pennsylvania, died years ago 1 lost a good friend. He impressed me mightily with the horrors of war. In the eight hours that we rode to gether in the cars he recited to me the scenes through which he had passed in the civil war. He said that there came one battle upon which everything seemed to pivot. Telegrams from Washington said that the life of the nation depended on that struggle. He said to me: "I went' into that battle, sir, with my son. His mother and 1 thought everything of him. You know how a father will feel toward his son who is coming up manly and brave and good. Well, the battle opened and con centered, and it was awful. Horses and riders bent and twisted and piled up to gether. It was awful, sir. We quit firing and took to the point of the bayonet. Well, sir, I didn't feel like myself that day. I had prayed to God for strength for that particular battle, and I went into it feel ing that I had in my right arm the strength of ten giants," and as the Gov ernor brought his arm down on the back of the seat it fairlv made the car trcVnble. "Well." he said, "the battle was desperate, but wfter awhile we gained a little, and wo marched on a little. I turned round to the troops and shouted, 'Come on, boysl/ and I stepped across a dead soldier, and 10, it was my son! I saw at the first glance he was dead, and yet I did not dare to stop a minute, for the crisis had come in the bat tle, so I just got down on my knees, and I threw my arms around him. and I gave him one good kiss and said, 'Goo<l-by, dear,' and sprang up and shouted. 'Come on, bovs!' " So it is in the Christian con flict. It is a fierce fight. Heaven is wait ing for the bulletins to announce the tre mendous issue. Hail of shot, gash of sa bre, fall of battleax, groaning on every side. We cannot stop for loss or bereavement or anything else. With one ardent em brace "and loving kiss we utter our fare wells and then cry: "Come on, boys!" There are other heights to be captured, there are other foes to be conquered, there are other crowns to be won." Yet as one of the Lord's surgeons I must bind up two or three wounds. Just lift them now. whatever they be. I have been told there is nothing like salt to stop the bleeding of a wound, and so I take this salt of Christ's gospel and put it on the lacerated soul. It smarts a little at first, but see, the bleeding stops, and lo the flesh comes again as the flesh of a little child! "Salt i» good." "Comfort one another with these words." Great Britain imported 16.000,000 great hundreds (1,820,000,000) of eggs last year. THE GREAT DESTROYER. SOME STARTLING FACTS ABOUT THE VICE OF INTEMPERANCE. Oar Coming Banner Poverty Can He Traced to t>tquor In at Least Twenty, five Per Ceut. of Case*—'Evil of Drunk enness Decrenslnic In Tills Country. 0 Bay! do you see on our star-spangled l%g The red stains of a crime that dishonors, the nation, Which soon in its course would to infamy drag • And make of our land one vast desola tion? See the woe and despair! hark! what cries lill the air As the wide flood of ruin pours on every where!— 'Tis the curse of the demon that fain would enslave All the free, and defile all the good and the brave. Long—long doth the tyrant his iron sway wield In paths drenched in blood, law and order defying, Till thousands of homes of the drunkards are filled With vain prayers for help or the groans of the dying; Yet the lava-tide flows, amid shrieks, wails and throes Of victims that know not relief nor repose. And still the striped banner in mockery waves Over millions of souls rushing onto their graves. O! then, let us rise in our God-given might To drive out the foe and all his pollution With prayers and with ballots, to urge on the fight, And courage that never will know dimi nution. So, with victory blest, in peace we shall rest, Assured of our birthright of Freedom pos sessed, While the Star-spangled Banner forever shall wave O'er the land of the free —the pure—and the brave! —National Advocate. I.lqnnr-Drinkliig In America. In a very interesting and Instructive book written by a John Koren, some re sults are given of the inquiry of the "Com mittee of Fifty" into the liquor problem, or drinking customs, of the United States. Among those who come under the notice of the charity organization societies pov erty can be traced to liquor in at least 25 tier cent, of the cases. Of those in alms houses 37 of every 100 would not be there but for drink. The committee investigated into the cases of no less than 13.400 con victs, and found that in one-half of the cases the crime was chiefly due to intem perance; it was a leading cause in 31 per cent., and a sole cause in 16 per cent, of the cases. Some, however, can only be made to view intemperance through the pocket, and even in this aspect it is something awful. The value of the liquor produced annually in this country is over $200,000,000. Not less than $1,000,000,000 of capital is em ployed in the business. A revenue of near ly §200,000,000 is collected annually from the business. To cap all, no less than 1.800.000 persons directly derive their sup port from this neiarious business, which is ruining the lives here of their lellow beings and destroying their hopes of happi ness hereafter. Most sincerely might all wish that both persons and money might far otherwise be employed. Notwithstanding the undeniable statistics adduced it is asserted by some that pov erty is not so much an effect of intemper ance as it is a cause of intemperance. This is simply a baseless assertion scarcely worthy of serious consideration. There must in the first place be something radi cally wrong with the man or woman who "flics to drink" to drown sorrow or other trouble. There must not only be a weak ness. but an inherent desire in the indi vidual for liquor, otherwise he would not adopt that mode of dulling his memorv in preference to another, or rather than fight against it as becomes a man. In those who thus "take to drink" we think there can be traced not only n weakness, but a decided tendency to insanity, which is sim ply stimulated and hastened by liquor. He has but the semblance of man who would thus seek oblivion from trouble in unconsciousness. He is worse than the poor ostrich that seeks to evade its pur suers by simply hiding its head in the sand while all the rest of its bodv is exposed to view. The man's troubles like the bird's pursuers are still there, and his evil, of whatever nature it may be. is simply ag gravated and made worse by drink. By drowning his consciousness and acquiring a drinking habit a man is but removing the brake which prevents his going rap idlv down hill to destruction. The committee say that in their opinion the evil of drunkenness is decreasing in this country, and there are few outside the "trade who will not rejoice to hear it. In some measure the decrease is doubt less due to the fact that the complicated nature of modern industries necessitates perfect sobriety in the employes—numer ous processes requiring to be performed with the utmost exactness and precision. It would seem likely that with the rush and hurry of modern life the habit of drinking to excess will be driven out by sheer necessity.—Presbyterian Banner. Total Abstinence anil Soldiers. According to official reports nearly 4000 of the men who have gone to South Africa on active sen-ice are members of the Army Temperance Association. Lord Koberts. in commenting on this report, added that he had been struck by the re turns from India, which showed a remark able difference between the convictions re corded in IS9B among abstainers and non abstainers. Among the former only 4.12 in 1000 had been court-martialed, 'while among the non-abstainers the figures were 30.8 in 1000. In 1897 the figures were much the same. The admissions into hospitals were also largely in excess in the case of non-abstainer#. It appeared that <luring the Tirah war 2000 men went through the whole campaign without taking a drop o£ alcohol. This new and significant tendency in the army appears to be the result not so much of any religious or moral enterprise as of a growing conviction that a free use of alcohol interferes with the efficiency of the troops. General Kitchener prohibited all drinks containing alcohol in the Sudan - campaign, except the few that were pre scribed by the medical officers, and after a little preliminary grumbling the men dis covered for themselves that the Comman der-in-Chief was right when he emptied out into the desert a cart of Scotch whisky that had been smuggled into Berber for sale to the troops. In the Ashanti war and the Kaffir war the good health of the troops was also ascribed to the suspension of the rum ration.—lndependent. The Crnsade In Brief. Respect yourself, your parents, brother* and sisters, shun the company of topers, and never darken the door of a saloon. One immutable truth is that, whether alcohol be fuel food or not, it is BO dan gerous that it would be better to live most abstemiously than to depend on it for any portion of sustenance where anything else can be obtained. An Ohio woman has just been given : verdict for S6OOO against two saloon keep ers who sold liquor to her husband, which caused him to become helpless, and he lay , out«ide and was badly frozen. His hand had to be amputated. The case was bit- j terlr fought by the saloon men.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers